Although primarily a sculptor, she etches, paints and has participated in performance works, videos and films. Throughout her career, Bourgeois has maintained a unique and independent vision, exploring the image of the body to express ideas about universal questions. Her work affirms that the enduring power of the spirit can transcend borders imposed by geography and state. Bourgeois received early training in her native France during the height of Modernism. In Paris, she studied under Brancusi, Giacometti, and Leger.
       In 1938 she married art historian Robert Goldwater and emigrated to the United States. Throughout the 1970s, her work was exhibited with increasing frequency, influencing other artists and public taste.A turning point came in 1981, when Bourgeois became the first woman to have a retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art. At age 71, she might have let that exhibition, which featured four decades of her work, stand as a career climax. Instead, the retrospective heralded a new era of productivity, earning